The Windham Bombers will be taking the plunge, becoming the latest area school to make the switch to 8-man football. Windham will join the Northern 8 Conference next season, alongside Kennedy Catholic from Hermitage, Pa.

While participation numbers aren’t at a critical low for Windham – around 50 percent of the male students at the high school participate in football – the school is still small. Windham’s male enrollment is the second-lowest (ahead of Bloomfield) in the Northeastern Athletic Conference with 54 students. Pymatuning Valley, on Windham’s schedule yearly, dwarfs the Bombers with 156 male students by comparison.

Originally, Windham coach Jake Eye was not on board with the move, but from a long-term numbers perspective, the move makes sense.

“Well, I was apprehensive because I’m as old school as the next guy,” Eye said. “Selfishly, when I think about when I played football, and when you think of football, you think of traditional 11-man football. But the more I thought about our current situation and with our numbers and just allowing the kids to have a chance to compete, it made sense. It’s not about the coaches, it’s not about the parents, it’s not about the administration or the distance and the driving. Those are all excuses for the adults. In reality, it’s not about us adults and the parents, it’s about what’s best for the kids, and that’s what ultimately swayed my vote.”

Another factor came from seeing the success of Chalker, a program who was in a worse situation. The change has done wonders for Chalker as a school, let alone the program, which made it to the 8-man state championship game this season.

“When they tell us that school morale is at an all-time high, let’s face it, you know as well as I do, school morale is built around football,” Eye said. “It’s not built around baseball, maybe some schools are built around basketball, but it’s usually football. It’s what sets the tone for the year. People rally around football, and when we talked to Chalker, they were adamant that this year, the morale at their school is at an all-time high. They said the kids love it, and they had a blast.”

While the Northern 8 began in the northwest corner of the state, it’s taking a foothold on the eastern half as well. Windham and Kennedy Catholic, located right over the Ohio-Pennsylvania border, join Sebring and Chalker in the league.

“Windham is practically in the backyard of Sebring, and Chalker, which really boosts our presence in the eastern part of the Buckeye State,” Northern 8 commissioner Lynn Groll said in a press release. “I know from my conversations with Windham athletic director Dougle Hankins, the Bombers and their community are excited to be part of the Northern 8.

“The Northern 8 Football Conference is in a great place right now. I am confident Ohio is close to adding more eight-man programs and is potentially on the doorstep of more eight-man conferences forming. I feel it is time the Ohio High School Athletic Association got behind 8-man football and sanctioned it with a playoff each fall.”

Hankins said the decision hasn’t been unanimously popular amongst the community.

“At the end of the day, do our kids really care if they’re playing against eight kids, or if they’re playing against 11 kids? The 70-year-olds out there that are, ‘We got to hang tough. We just gotta do the old school approach. Go back to when you were 16 and you were playing backyard football. You never played three on three? You never played four on four? You didn’t care. You just wanted to play, and that’s how our kids are. They just want to play,” Hankins said. “Football’s football. It’s not like we’re going out there and playing two-hand touch. We’re still tackling. … I think if we go out there and make the playoffs, or we are in the state championship, like Chalker was, if we can show some success, I think that’ll be beneficial to everybody in the community.”

There’s already a rich tradition at Windham for sub-11-man football. During the late 1930s until 1947, Windham had a 6-man football program. A good one too. The program was so successful, it sparked the origin of the nickname Bombers, coined by Ravenna Record-Courier sportswriter Oliver Wolcott.

In 1939, the program’s second season, Windham finished undefeated. They outscored their opponents 281-26, and were crowned state champions by Stephen Epler, receiving 15 dollars worth of athletic equipment in reward.

Epler invented the sport five years prior, giving small high schools the means to field a football program during the Great Depression. He also was involved with American Boy Magazine, which served as the unofficial governing body of the sport.

The Bombers went undefeated again the following season, including a 39-1 victory over the Canadian national champions, Stamford Collegiate.

While American Boy Magazine didn’t proclaim another state champion following the 1940 season, Windham’s victory over Stamford Collegiate earned it the distinction of being named international 6-man champions.

It’s also not the first time the Bombers have played 8-man football. Back in 2019, Mathews was struggling with numbers and was bouncing between 8- and 11-man games on a week-to-week basis. When the time came to play Windham, the only way the game could be played was an 8-man contest, so the Bombers complied, winning 50-12.

Eye coached in that game, and the experience made this transition a little easier to accept.

“That was also kind of a turning point for me as well,” Eye said. “I do remember that game vividly. It was a lot of fun. The kids had a blast with it. It wasn’t much different, it really wasn’t. You’re still going to put your helmet and your shoulder pads on, and you’re still going to go out and you’re going to hit people. You’re taking away three kids from the field, and the field diminishes a little bit in size, but it’s still football, and at the end of the day, that’s what kids want to do. They want to play football. They don’t care if it’s 6-man, 11-man, 12-man, it doesn’t matter to them.”